Fernsehturm, Berlin

The Fernsehturm (literally, “TV tower”) was built in 1969 and features a revolving cafe and observation deck. Aside from the obvious function of providing TV and radio signals for the city the underlying motivation for the tower was to create a powerful political symbol in East Germany that could be seen by the West.

The buildings around the tower appear to be in the shape of an aeroplane, but I couldn’t find anything saying if this was intentional or not. Also look for the tower’s large shadow extending to the North, the train station ‘Alexanderplatz’ just to the east and the orange roofed church St. Marien to the west .

The TV Tower was also created so the USSR could eavesdrop on secret radio broadcasts by the Americans. The American’s mounted their listening antennas on a hill created from bombed rubble after the end of the war. Unfortunately, that hill is south of the Olympic Stadium and not in a high res area:

I think the airplane shape is a side effect of the angle at which the picture was taken. The tail, at least, is clearly a tent-shaped structure, look at the shadow. See also this picture from the first site, showing a tent-shaped structure behind the tower.

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